Stephen Hawking Died At 76: Cause Of Death Is His long struggle with motor neurone disease

Stephen Hawking, the brilliant British theoretical physicist who overcame a debilitating disease to publish wildly popular books probing the mysteries of the universe, has died, according to a family spokesman. He was 76.

Considered by many to be the world’s greatest living scientist, Hawking was also a cosmologist, astronomer, mathematician and author of numerous books including the landmark “A Brief History of Time,” which has sold more than 10 million copies.

With fellow physicist Roger Penrose, Hawking merged Einstein’s theory of relativity with quantum theory to suggest that space and time would begin with the Big Bang and end in black holes. Hawking also discovered that black holes are not completely black but emit radiation and will likely eventually evaporate and disappear.

Hawking suffered from ALS (amyotrophic lateral sclerosis), a neurodegenerative disease commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, which is usually fatal within a few years. He was diagnosed in 1963, when he was 21, and doctors initially only gave him a few years to live.

THE greatest mind of the generation — physicist Professor Stephen Hawking — has died at the age of 76 after a long struggle with motor neurone disease.

His children Lucy, Robert and Tim said in a statement: “We are deeply saddened that our beloved father passed away today.”

If you hadn’t seen the wheelchair-bound genius on documentaries or the news, you’d probably have had a window to his early life through the movie The Theory of Everything.

Hawking beat the odds.

Stephen Hawking Death

He lived decades longer than his doctors predicted when he was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) — Lou Gehrig’s disease — when just 21.

By the end, he had lost almost all control over every muscle in his body.

For years he’s only been able to communicate through individually tailored technology, exploiting what limited muscle control he had to activate a virtual computer keyboard.